Posts Tagged ‘brown’

I’ve had this background of faint green leaves or feathers for a long time now, just waiting for the right image to go on top of it. I decided it needed a bird of prey to glide along under a sunlit canopy of leaves. The subtle textures of green in the background get somewhat lost in the glare of the scanner; this is definitely another piece that has a lot to offer in person.

I like the way there’s more space in front of the bird than behind, as if to suggest an endless forest of new green leaves just waiting ahead.

Gliding Under the Canopy, 6″x4″ watercolor crayon and watercolor on paper, $199 with free shipping.

Gliding Under the Canopy, detail, by Amy Crook

Above, you can see some more of the soft green texture that permeates the background. Below, I’ve got the piece tucked into a frame, where the green glows behind the golden brown bird.

I guess there’s not a lot of Ulrichs or Ursulas out there, but if there are, this is the letter for them! I personally plan to use it to spell STFU until someone buys one of the letters. And, of course, you can always put U and I together and be a terrible pickup line.

Uncial is one of the classic calligraphy fonts, so I wanted to do a proper homage in warm earthy brown and cheerful new-leaf green. There’s just a touch of gold decoration in the fattest parts of the letter, giving it a lovely bit of sparkle.

U is for Uncial, 5″x5″ pen & ink, Japanese watercolor and glitter gel pen on paper.

U is for Uncial, detail, by Amy Crook

Above, you can see the gold glitter illuminating the letter with just a touch of sparkle. Below, you can revisit the last few weeks of letters, plus the lovely, flourishing F.

One of the things I love about this series is the physicality of it, the way the glitter encourages the viewer to try to catch the light, to pick the piece up and move it around. In this one, I went a step farther and added a physical dimension to it by building up layers of cut and painted paper. The gold at the edges helps each layer stand out, even more than just the cascading autumnal colors.

L is for Layers, 5″x5″ Japanese watercolor and glitter gel pen on collaged paper.

L is for Layers, detail, by Amy Crook

Above you can see a close-up of the overlapping corners, the glued paper growing tall as it builds layer upon layer. Below, the L is hanging out with a preview of the N in my little writing desk.

I used red-brown at one corner and yellow ochre at the other to make an earthy, warm wash, and then it sat around for a while while I wasn’t sure what to do with it. But when in doubt, I always turn to tentacles, and so I’ve added a third painting to the series. I rather like the effect of the lunar black tentacles on the powdery-matte Japanese watercolor background, with the warm glow coming through them.

Tentacle Spiral 3, watercolor on paper.

Tentacle Spiral 3, detail, by Amy Crook

Above you can see a close-up of the tentacles, and the textures of paper and paint together. I’ve made the detail photo into a computer wallpaper, this one’s less widescreen than yesterday’s for those of you with more square monitors. Below, I’ve put the painting in a frame so you can see how it might look, tucked in a frame on a shelf or perhaps a little piece of wall somewhere, adding tentacles to your home or office.

I went for a warm, soft brown on this installment of the tentacles, with layers of tentacles fading into the murky waters. the tentacles are painted with my favorite granulating lunar black to give that lovely texture, and the background itself has some bloodstone in it to add to the texture. I find these very meditative to do, just thinking about how to arrange the curls and swirls in an attractive pattern without too much repeat or too little visual interest.

The visual texture on this one is very rich and soft, though the paper is quite stiff. Beware the velvety tentacles, their embrace is insidious.

Tentacle Deeps 26, 5.25″x7″ watercolor on paper.

I haven’t actually framed this one yet, it’ll have to go in an 8″x10″ frame with a mat because of the slightly too-wide paper that a certain artist was slackery about tearing to size. You can still enjoy the traditional close-up shot below, though.

This is one of those pieces that’s frustratingly difficult to color match or photograph in any reasonably representative way. The background is warm golds and orange-browns with layers of spirals in more browns and metallic copper. The salt pools are all centered over shiny copper spirals, though the salt itself didn’t pick up much color at all from either the background or the copper. There’s even a few golden leaves floating subtly through everything else, and that and the original Sherlock Holmes story are where the piece gets its name.

I wanted to revisit the autumnal color palette of Autumn Winds, so I created this piece with different materials. The paper is a thick, soft cream-coloured printing paper, and the little spirals use quinacridone burnt orange paint instead of the less lightfast pen ink, though the pigment doesn’t infuse as well into the salt. Instead of tea there’s all watercolor paints for the rest, breezy spirals gathered around each salt pool like strange seeds tossed on a light fall breeze.

Autumn Breeze, 8″x6″ watercolor and salt on Arches cover white paper.

Below you can see how the salt crystals spread a little into the textured paper without going too far outside their original pool. The actual color of the piece is somewhere in between the two images, more saturated than the scan but less so than the detail photo.

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